The UX Audit Checklist We Use on Every $2,500 Friction Scan

Most UX audit checklists are written by people who have never had to defend their findings to a CEO. This one is different: it is the working checklist we run on every paid UX Friction Scan, and every item earns its place by regularly finding revenue leaks.

Start where the money leaks: the critical journey

Do not audit the whole product. Audit the one journey that pays your bills, signup to first value for a SaaS product, browse to checkout for commerce, application to approval for fintech. Walk it as a new user, on a real device, with realistic data.

• Can a first-time user state what the product does within 5 seconds of landing?
• How many decisions does the user make before first value? Count every field, toggle, and choice.
• Where does the journey force a context switch (email verification, app download, document upload)? Each one is a drop-off cliff.
• What happens on failure? Error states are where trust dies quietly.

Onboarding

• Is the first screen after signup an empty state or a guided first win?
• Does the product ask for information before it has demonstrated value?
• Is progress visible? Users abandon what they cannot measure.

Trust signals

Especially in fintech, health, and AI products, users are silently asking: can I trust this? Audit for security cues at moments of commitment, plain-language explanations of what happens to data, visible pricing with no surprise steps, and human recourse (a real way to get help).

Navigation and information architecture

• Can users predict what is behind every top-level label? Test with a stranger, not your team.
• Is the same concept named the same way everywhere? Inconsistent vocabulary reads as broken.
• Does search actually work for the top 20 queries your support team hears?

Forms and inputs

• Every field must justify its existence. Each one costs conversion.
• Inline validation, not submit-and-pray.
• Mobile keyboards: email fields get email keyboards, number fields get number pads. Small, constantly missed.

Scoring: impact versus effort

A finding without a priority is a complaint. We score every issue on two axes: how much it costs users (evidence: analytics, session recordings, support tickets) and how expensive it is to fix. The top-right quadrant becomes the roadmap. Ship those first, measure, repeat.